


Sportball

by PBS_is_killing_me



Category: Game Grumps
Genre: Established Relationship, PTSD I guess? I actually don't know if that's what this is, Panic Attacks sort of, You just moved in together, reader is upset and Dan is comforting, sportsball
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-28
Updated: 2017-11-28
Packaged: 2019-02-07 23:22:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12851733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PBS_is_killing_me/pseuds/PBS_is_killing_me
Summary: "Logically, you knew that there was no reason to be worried. Dan was one of the sweetest people you had ever met. Definitely the sweetest guy you had ever dated. He couldn’t hurt a fly. So logically, you knew that everything was going to be fine. Logically, you knew that it was incredibly unlikely that Dan was going to start throwing shit at you just because his team was losing. You told yourself this over and over again, but it was no use. No amount of logic could stop the on-edge feeling that was slowly mounting to a dull panic."Reader has an embarrassing and somewhat irrational fear regarding one of Dan's favorite hobbies.





	Sportball

“FFFFFFFFGGGGLBLEH!” You let out a random string of sounds and grabbed your foot, hopping up and down trying not to drop your laptop. You had been on your way to sit in the living room and work on your current writing project when you had stubbed your toe on a rather heavy box that was sitting in the hallway. When the pain finally subsided, you took a look inside the box. Books. Of course it was books. 

You remembered Dan complaining about the insane number of books you were bringing into the house. 

“I can see my tombstone now. Here lies Dan, who drowned in an avalanche of books in his own home.” You chuckled at the memory of him lamenting his inevitable book related death. But the two of you had managed to find space for all of your books, as well as the rest of your belongings. There were only a few boxes left to unpack and they were all sitting in inconvenient places around the house. You considered stopping to unpack this one now, but you really had to get to work. You settled for pushing the box to the side and out of the way for now. 

You made it to the living room with no further incident. You set up your laptop on the coffee table and opened up your notes right next to it. You turned the TV on with the volume low for some background noise while you got to work. 

You lost track of exactly how long you had been working when you heard the front door open. 

“Hey. How was work?” You called out without looking up from what you were doing. 

“It was good. Brian and I got a lot done. More than we were expecting actually.” Dan said as he took off his jacket and shoes by the door. The first thing he did was walk over and place a gentle kiss on your cheek. You smiled up at him. 

“You ate at the office, right?” You asked. The two of you hadn’t really worked out any kind of routine yet, having recently moved in together. You had already known that he had somewhat of a hectic schedule and you were now learning just how hectic it was. It was hard to plan meals and things when he usually didn’t know exactly how long he was going to be at work. 

“Yeah, I had sushi.” Dan plopped down on the other side of the couch and stretched. You turned back to your project. 

“Are you actually watching this?” Dan asked, gesturing to the TV. You shook your head no. “Do you mind if I change it to the Giants game?”

A small seed of dread planted itself in your stomach. You made every effort not to show it though. 

“Sure,” you replied, hoping that your voice sounded normal. 

He picked up the remote and changed the channel. _You can do this, you can do this,_ you said to yourself. You were determined not to make this weird. It was just a game and you weren’t even going to pay attention to it. You turned you attention back to your computer with determination. 

It might not have been so bad if he hadn’t turned the volume up. He only turned it up a few ticks, but it was enough to break through your concentration. 

You didn’t really know much about sports, you generally avoided watching them at all costs, but you knew that Dan loved football. You knew that he was a Giants fan. And you also knew that the Giants were not doing well this season. You glanced up at the TV to look at the score. They were losing this game too. The seed of dread grew. 

You tried to focus on your work, but you knew it was no use. You were scared and frustrated in equal parts. 

Logically, you knew that there was no reason to be worried. Dan was one of the sweetest people you had ever met. Definitely the sweetest guy you had ever dated. He couldn’t hurt a fly. So logically, you knew that everything was going to be fine. Logically, you knew that it was incredibly unlikely that Dan was going to start throwing shit at you just because his team was losing. You told yourself this over and over again, but it was no use. No amount of logic could stop the on-edge feeling that was slowly mounting to a dull panic. 

The sounds of whistles and cheering and booing from the TV seemed much louder to you than they actually were. It was all you could thing about. You couldn’t even bring yourself to really look at Dan. You just sat there pretending to work, waiting for something to happen. 

You weren’t looking at the TV, and you wouldn’t have understood what was happening even if you were, but you recognized the sound of a Bad Sport Thing happening.  
In your peripheral vision, you saw Dan’s fist clench just a little bit and you couldn’t take it anymore. You bolted up and headed straight to the bedroom without saying anything. 

Just before you closed the door, you heard Dan’s confused “Babe?” but you didn’t stop. 

You closed the door behind you and sat on the bed. You took deep breaths to try to calm yourself down. Not only were you panicky, you were embarrassed. You knew that this was a stupid thing to be afraid of. You just couldn’t help yourself. There were a thousand memories flashing through your head. And you couldn’t get them to stop. You resisted the childish urge to hide in the closet like you used to. 

You couldn’t hear the TV anymore. It had either been muted or paused, followed by Dan’s footsteps. He knocked softly on the door. “Babe? You okay?” he asked from the other side of the door. 

You managed a shaky response. “Yeah. All good.”

“Can I come in?” he asked. 

You didn’t really want him to see you like this, but you also didn’t want him to worry. “Yeah,” you answered after a few moments.  
He opened the door and sat next to you on the bed. He placed a gentle arm over your shoulders. With a few more deep breaths you were ready to talk to him. You looked up at him and saw that he was equally concerned and confused. He spoke first. 

“What happened? Are you okay? You seemed fine when I walked in.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I know this is stupid.” You hesitated to continue. You always hated saying this out loud. But Dan was patient. “I kind of have an irrational fear of being in the same room as someone while they’re watching sports.”

Dan still looked confused, but at least he didn’t laugh. 

So you explained everything to him. You explained how even though you didn’t really know much about sports, your dad did. He watched sports all the time. He also had severe anger issues. He was kind of an angry guy in general, but it was always worse when he was watching sports. He always wanted you to watch the game with him and it would start out fine, but if his team started to slip behind, he would become irrationally angry. It would start with shouting and, depending on how badly the team did, could escalate anywhere from punching holes in the wall to throwing things. Often the things he threw would be heavy and they would be aimed at you. When his team lost he would be furious for the rest of the day. He would look for more things to be mad about and he would take it out on everything and everyone around him. Unfortunately, your dad always seemed to support shitty teams, so this was a regular occurrence in your house growing up. 

Now it was your natural instinct to leave the room and hide as soon as someone turned the TV to a sports channel. Even though you knew it was irrational, even though you knew that most people didn’t react that way to sports, you couldn’t help but panic. 

Dan listened to this whole story with his arm still comfortingly draped over your shoulders. That was one of the things you loved about Dan. He was such a good listener. He seemed genuinely shocked. He had never met your dad before and maybe now he was starting to understand why. 

“I’m so sorry that happened to you,” he said. “I had no idea. I’ll go turn it off and we can do something else.” 

You thought it was sweet of him to do that, but you hated feeling like you were ruining someone else’s fun. 

“That’s okay. You can finish watching it if you want. I’ve calmed down now. I’ll just bring my laptop in here and work.”

Dan looked skeptical. “Are you sure? I don’t have to watch the game. We can watch something else instead.”

You gave him a quick kiss before answering. “Thank you, but I’m fine now. I’ll just bring my laptop in here and if you turn the volume down just a touch, I won’t even be able to hear it.”

He still didn’t look completely convinced. “Dan, I’m not going to make you stop watching football forever,” you said as you walked back to the living room to get your stuff. “That would be ridiculous. Finish watching the game if you want to. I’ll be in the bedroom.”

You were eventually able to convince Dan that you really were okay, and he did go back to watching the game with the volume turned way down. You got back to work in the bedroom. 

After a while, you get as much work done as you thought you could for the night and decided to go back and sit with Dan. Now that you were ready for it, it wouldn’t be so bad. You reminded yourself that you were safe now. It had been a long time since your safety depended on some shitty sports team.

You walked back into the living room. You sort of remembered how long football games generally took and you were pretty sure this one had to be almost over. Dan immediately paused the game. He was surprised when you sat down next to him. “Do you want me to change it?” he asked. 

“Nope.” You started to cheer with mock enthusiasm. “Yeah! Do the thing! Score the points!”

Dan laughed. You immediately assumed your normal TV watching position on the couch. Dan relaxed and slouching, you curled up almost in his lap with his arms around you.

You only caught the last five minutes of the game and you didn’t really comprehend anything that was happening. The Giants ended up losing. Dan was more disappointed than angry. 

Immediately after the game he switched it to a movie for the two of you to watch together. You felt safe in his arms and now that it was something other than sports on, you felt relaxed. You felt so relaxed in fact, that you started dozing off. 

You felt Dan kiss the top of your head. “Love you,” He whispered into your hair. 

“Love you too,” you whispered back just before you fell asleep.

**Author's Note:**

> So, I wrote this and then I considered not even posting it because I thought it might be a weirdly specific premise and also weirdly personal. That's because the premise for this is actually true. My dad actually has anger issues and he used to punch holes in the wall and throw things at me when his teams were losing. Now I always panic when I hear someone put any kind of sportball game on TV. I know that's a weirdly specific thing to be afraid of and I'm not sure if anyone will be able to relate to it, but I figured I'd share it anyways just in case anyone could relate to it. And even if you can't relate to the specific situation, maybe you can relate to feeling embarrassed about having irrational fears about something. Either way, constructive criticism is welcome as always.


End file.
